The road less traveled...back to good health! They have lice, mites, scale mites, worms, anemia, gl

[35chick4kid1dog]

I will hopefully get some pictures for you this afternoon. Once my phone charges!

And the cooking lessons are over. And the school work is finished. And the dog is walked. EVENTUALLY I'll HAVE to go check on the chickens...i just hope there's daylight left! HAHA!!

Then again, they would be holding still once they're roosting.... Hmmmm.......

Along the feeding time line.... I've always done free choice. I have the feeder hanging in the coop. If I want them to forage more, would it be wiser to take it out in the morning and not replace it until later in the afternoon? I'm always afraid there won't be enough good forage places where they can get adequate nutrition. I really need to put my seed blend to work and find a place to plant a nice huge plot of chicken pasture. The problem is tilling up the grass for planting it. Not sure how the landlady would feel about that?!

Yesterday, though, they found an ant nest where the flyers were leaving the hill for the fall. It was a chicken buffet! They were all going crazy, snapping them out of the air and gobbling them up as they came out of the nest. There was another hole just a few feet away and those girls were pecking just as fast as they could manage!

It was funny to watch.

 

[Miss Lydia]

What bothers me is the non reaction of the chickens, rooster included....they did not regard the dog as a threat.

I wonder about mine too since they are around our 4 dogs all the time.

 

[Beekissed]

Ever since I've had my flock I've always feed in the morning giving enough to last the day. I've always felt this was the right thing to do, my flock forages all day long and still manages to eat all their feed. So your saying it's best to only feed once a day.and in the evenings during warm months and mornings during cold months? I go through alot of feed too. That I would like to cut down on. They get their ff in late morning after it's warmed up a bit. Can you talk a little more on this?

Yep...if you free range, it will save you money and stimulate the birds to be better foragers. A hungry chicken is a great forager. In the warmer months when forage is good, I feed in the evening. This gives any bird that didn't find adequate forage a full belly before bedtime...no one goes to bed hungry.

In the winter, I feed once in the morning(same amount) and they will pick at it all day and still not go to bed hungry. They are less active in the winter, thus burn off less fuel from their feed. They need to maintain a good fat layer in the winter but chickens, much like dogs and cats, do not need to have constant feed in their face.

It's not that way in nature and it shouldn't be that way in the coop/run. The biggest mistake people make with pets is feeding free choice, believing that is how it would be in a natural setting and not wanting the animals to "go hungry". In real life, out in the wild, neither dogs nor cats are always successful on finding foods throughout a day, nor do they always search and hunt for them. They have meals, they have rest time and active times but they don't usually have a buffet off of which they nibble all day. Just us humans have developed that tendency....

I will hopefully get some pictures for you this afternoon. Once my phone charges!

And the cooking lessons are over. And the school work is finished. And the dog is walked. EVENTUALLY I'll HAVE to go check on the chickens...i just hope there's daylight left! HAHA!!

Then again, they would be holding still once they're roosting.... Hmmmm.......

Along the feeding time line.... I've always done free choice. I have the feeder hanging in the coop. If I want them to forage more, would it be wiser to take it out in the morning and not replace it until later in the afternoon? I'm always afraid there won't be enough good forage places where they can get adequate nutrition. I really need to put my seed blend to work and find a place to plant a nice huge plot of chicken pasture. The problem is tilling up the grass for planting it. Not sure how the landlady would feel about that?!

Yesterday, though, they found an ant nest where the flyers were leaving the hill for the fall. It was a chicken buffet! They were all going crazy, snapping them out of the air and gobbling them up as they came out of the nest. There was another hole just a few feet away and those girls were pecking just as fast as they could manage!

It was funny to watch.

They get more adequate nutrition on forage than we could ever give them in a feed mix...the proteins and greens they find are much more digestible and more utilized than are the feeds we supply, so they are getting more nutrition out of less food by foraging.

Yes, I'd encourage more foraging by just feeding in the evening during months of high forage...even in the fall the bugs can be found and grass is still being grazed. As long as they get a gut full of food once a day, they are good to go. A leaner~but not skinny~bird is a better layer and enjoys better health throughout their reproductive life. Same as with us humans...and that is a fact coming right out if the mouth of a fat woman!

If only someone would withhold our feeds for us.....

 

[mendocinosunris]

Yep...if you free range, it will save you money and stimulate the birds to be better foragers. A hungry chicken is a great forager. In the warmer months when forage is good, I feed in the evening. This gives any bird that didn't find adequate forage a full belly before bedtime...no one goes to bed hungry.

In the winter, I feed once in the morning(same amount) and they will pick at it all day and still not go to bed hungry. They are less active in the winter, thus burn off less fuel from their feed. They need to maintain a good fat layer in the winter but chickens, much like dogs and cats, do not need to have constant feed in their face.

It's not that way in nature and it shouldn't be that way in the coop/run. The biggest mistake people make with pets is feeding free choice, believing that is how it would be in a natural setting and not wanting the animals to "go hungry". In real life, out in the wild, neither dogs nor cats are always successful on finding foods throughout a day, nor do they always search and hunt for them. They have meals, they have rest time and active times but they don't usually have a buffet off of which they nibble all day. Just us humans have developed that tendency....

They get more adequate nutrition on forage than we could ever give them in a feed mix...the proteins and greens they find are much more digestible and more utilized than are the feeds we supply, so they are getting more nutrition out of less food by foraging.

Yes, I'd encourage more foraging by just feeding in the evening during months of high forage...even in the fall the bugs can be found and grass is still being grazed. As long as they get a gut full of food once a day, they are good to go. A leaner~but not skinny~bird is a better layer and enjoys better health throughout their reproductive life. Same as with us humans...and that is a fact coming right out if the mouth of a fat woman!

If only someone would withhold our feeds for us.....

Good advice, b...wait, what?
I object!

Nobody's gonna stand between me and my Ben & Jerry's.

 

[morsekathan]

Yep...if you free range, it will save you money and stimulate the birds to be better foragers. A hungry chicken is a great forager. In the warmer months when forage is good, I feed in the evening. This gives any bird that didn't find adequate forage a full belly before bedtime...no one goes to bed hungry.

In the winter, I feed once in the morning(same amount) and they will pick at it all day and still not go to bed hungry. They are less active in the winter, thus burn off less fuel from their feed. They need to maintain a good fat layer in the winter but chickens, much like dogs and cats, do not need to have constant feed in their face.

It's not that way in nature and it shouldn't be that way in the coop/run. The biggest mistake people make with pets is feeding free choice, believing that is how it would be in a natural setting and not wanting the animals to "go hungry". In real life, out in the wild, neither dogs nor cats are always successful on finding foods throughout a day, nor do they always search and hunt for them. They have meals, they have rest time and active times but they don't usually have a buffet off of which they nibble all day. Just us humans have developed that tendency....

They get more adequate nutrition on forage than we could ever give them in a feed mix...the proteins and greens they find are much more digestible and more utilized than are the feeds we supply, so they are getting more nutrition out of less food by foraging.

Yes, I'd encourage more foraging by just feeding in the evening during months of high forage...even in the fall the bugs can be found and grass is still being grazed. As long as they get a gut full of food once a day, they are good to go. A leaner~but not skinny~bird is a better layer and enjoys better health throughout their reproductive life. Same as with us humans...and that is a fact coming right out if the mouth of a fat woman!

If only someone would withhold our feeds for us.....

I just feed mine once a day also at night; they free range. I only have 5 in my flock, but I don't use more than 100 pounds of food a year. They eat more in the winter when I feed them at night and in the morning. I also use about 100 pounds of scratch (actually Rocking Rooster!) a year and maybe 25 pounds of sunflower seeds. Oh, and they get dinner too - yogurt, cheese and rice or quinoa. Sometimes oatmeal. I find that they lay more consistently if they get a nice dinner.

 

[chickachee]

Anyone have any suggestions on what to do about a chicken that has one eye closed? She seems to be a bit scrunched up and right now is in the coop on the roost, while her cohorts are out and about foraging. Her other eye seems just fine and when she opens the shut one, it looks good too. I don't want to get all concerned if I can leave her overnight and see how she is tomorrow, but wondered if anything needs to be done today. I'm not panicking, just curious. Thanks!

 

[Beekissed]

Good advice, b...wait, what?
I object!

Nobody's gonna stand between me and my Ben & Jerry's.

Me neither...but I wish they would! If I had to forage for my foods all day I wouldn't way a metric ton....

 

[Mtn Laurel]

A word of caution to the FF makers. Or . . . "How Could I Do Something So Dumb"?

So, I've got these two buckets one inside the other. I'm using regular scrub-sized buckets, guess they're 2 gallon. Fed the gal's and decided I needed to add some extra feed/scratch/stuff to the mix.

For some reason I grabbed the handle of the inner-most bucket and went to pick it up. The two buckets separated and I slung FF all over the kitchen cabinets, it rolled down the front and formed a huge puddle in the kitchen floor.

I'm here to tell you that - in that context - FF looks and smells just like puke.

Thought I'd lose my lunch trying to clean it up. Ended up wiping it up with cloth towels and then put the towels on the deck to dry. Hopefully, all the food-matter will then shake out and I can wash - and probably rewash - the towels.

Just be careful when you pick up those buckets. Seriously!

 

[Pullet Surprise]

Bee...I think you are right about the yolks, I just opened two eggs laid today and the yolks were BIG - much bigger than they have been.!!!!!!!
They have been on FF about 3 and a half weeks now..

 

[galanie]

Yep, FF is the big yolk around here these days.


I've noticed it too.